Reign of the Hunters

A few more Fireballs and Holy Bolt struck Ye Ci, leaving her with only a quarter of her HP.

“Glistening Snow has attacked you, you may freely retaliate for twenty minutes.”

“MuQing has attacked you, you may freely retaliate for twenty minutes.“

...

So it was the players from Tang Dynasty. Ye Ci pressed herself as close to Ol’ Four’s back as possible while she observed her surroundings, searching for her two attackers; it wasn’t long before she saw a few familiar faces. It turned out that players from Tang Dynasty and Wolf Pack were having a turf war. If it was a turf war between other guilds, perhaps Ye Ci would be astonished. However, it was of no surprise to her once she saw that these two guilds were the ones fighting.

Both were famous, powerful guilds with the ambition to be ranked first in the Eastern Continent. The guilds were already at odds with each other over the rankings, butting heads at every opportunity. It was not uncommon to see them conflicting over anything that would benefit their guild.

Ye Ci commanded Ol’ Four to run in an erratic manner whilst making a break towards an area with more people, By doing so, not only would she be able to decrease her probability of getting hit, it’d also maximize her chances of concealing herself. Once she ran into the crowd of players, Ye Ci immediately leapt off Ol’ Four’s back and started sprinting.

It was clear that MuQing and Glistening Snow had locked onto her. Despite escaping into the player crowd, Fireballs and Holy Light Bullets still occasionally landed on her. Ye Ci took out a red potion from her inventory and downed it to replenish her diminishing HP bar. Keeping her body as low to the ground as possible, she swiftly made her way towards the rear of the Tang Dynasty’s players, where the Clerics were clustered together. Glistening Snow had spotted Ye Ci as she passed by the Clerics’ gathering spot.

At first, Ye Ci had believed that it was an accidental attack and thought nothing of it. However, MuQing’s attack had convinced her that the assault was intentional, and it is possible that Glistening Snow might be trying to take revenge on her for stealing the BOSS the other day.

Before long, Ye Ci was able to close in on Tang Dynasty’s Clerics. At that point, she had already gone into Stealth and recalled Ol’ Four, successfully giving Glistening Snow and MuQing the slip. Taking out her Venomous Scorpion Stinger, she stepped towards Glistening Snow.

At that moment, Glistening Snow was glancing about while she healed the players at the frontlines. She was apparently worried by Ye Ci’s sudden disappearance. Meanwhile, as the distance between the two gradually reduced, Ye Ci could smell the store-bought perfume from Glistening Snow.

To be honest, the perfume smelled good; it was a scent that any female would love, Ye Ci included. However, she would never use something like this on herself, not because she didn’t like to dress up, it was just that her profession as a Huntress would never allow her to do something that would risk compromising her actions.

Easily circling behind Glistening Snow, Ye Ci looked at her back where the heart was located. While melee classes equipped heavy armor to protect this vital area from any possible enemy attacks, classes with cloth equipment did not enjoy such special features. In order to wield their immense spiritual powers, they had to wrap themselves in light, soft cloth equipment. Although aesthetically pleasing to the eyes, the equipments’ defence values were close to zero.

Glistening Snow’s level should be somewhere around 20 and was definitely not above 22. The level gap between Ye Ci and her was fairly large, which was the reason why her attacks were ineffective against Ye Ci. Even Ye Ci felt that she had an unfair advantage against Glistening Snow.

As Ye Ci’s blade moved, Glistening Snow felt a chill at her breast as her HP bar was instantly cleared. She only managed to look down in time to see a sharp blade protruding out of her chest before her vision started to blur. Glistening Snow did not have enough strength to turn around, and the system soon informed her that she was the first one to die.

“Due to the attack that you initiated, Gongzi You attacked you in retaliation and you have been successfully killed.”

Glistening Snow’s death happened in an instant, Ye Ci’s figure was revealed for just a moment before she immediately drank an invisibility potion and hid herself once more before running towards MuQing’s direction.

Glistening Snow’s death happened so quickly, not even the surrounding clerics or the warriors protecting them noticed Ye Ci before her body fell to the ground. This caused Tang Dynasty’s players to be somewhat flustered: ”Glistening, how did you die?”

“I was ambushed by a Huntress.” Glistening Snow remained lying on the ground. As Ye Ci was still alive, she didn’t dare to immediately revive. She could only wait for Ye Ci to exit combat or die before she could respawn. “What’s the matter with you warriors? How could no one have realized that someone snuck in?” Glistening Snow was furious and chose to take it out on the people that were tasked with protecting her.

“That’s impossible, if she did sneak in, we would have definitely noticed. Furthermore, we didn’t even spot anybody in the vicinity right after you died. Since it was a Huntress that killed you, it’s got nothing to do with us, you must have been targeted and sniped to death.” The warriors that were charged with protecting the clerics immediately rebutted Glistening Snow. As they really did not see anyone just now, they too were in a state of confusion.

Normally this was nothing to be puzzled about, as usually, Rogues and Hunters could rarely max out their Stealth due to the lack of talent points. Furthermore, Ye Ci’s level was around 5 to 6 levels higher than theirs. With that kind of level penalty, the chances of them detecting Ye Ci couldn’t be any lower.

“I was definitely instakilled by a stab to the heart, and you guys are trying to tell me that I was sniped... What is wrong with you guys?” Glistening Snow fumed but she soon realised something was amiss, immediately opening up the guild channel and cried: ”MuQing, Gongzi You killed me, be careful!”

Even before she managed to finish her sentence, MuQing’s sullen voice sounded out: ”Your reminder came too late, I’m already dead.”

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know, she vanished.” This was the fact that made MuQing depressed the most. As a Mage, he had added his talent points into Mobile Casting, not allowing Ye Ci any opportunity to kill him. When Glistening Snow fell, he had a hunch that it was Gongzi You’s doing and immediately went on guard. However, for some unknown reason, he was still instakilled by a single stab from Gongzi You. Since he was a mobile caster, him dying in the midst of casting a spell did not attract too much attention. Probably only MuQing knew the the true cause of his death, while most players believed that he had been done in by a ranged player on the enemy side.

He had been killed by a single backstab through the heart. Instakill, it was an undeniable instant kill.

He was already Lvl 24, which was already good enough to be placed on the leaderboards, and yet he was instakilled by Gongzi You. This caused MuQing to feel extremely cautious and depressed whenever this Huntress was involved. Just like how when Glistening Snow was about to warn him, he was already lying dead on the ground.

His gauntlets had dropped, and yet no one had picked it up.

It was precisely due to this fact that MuQing had no idea of Gongzi You’s whereabouts. If she had picked up his dropped equipment, then he would at least have an idea of her area of operations, but she didn’t even bat an eyelid towards the dropped item. It was as though MuQing had fallen dead because he had reached the limits of his lifespan.

“Snow and MuQing, what the hell are you two doing!? This expedition has already had too many casualties and now you two joined them? MuQing, weren’t you supposed to be really good at PvP? Tell me, how did you die?” Wandering Clouds never imagined that MuQing, an expert in PvP, and a Cleric that was heavily protected, would be suddenly eliminated. The fact that this happened frustrated him to no end.

Currently, Tang Dynasty was in desperate need of healing. Although Glistening Snow was unable to provide a lot of healing as a whole, but under this kind of situation, even a little was better than nothing. Furthermore, their mobile turret MuQing who was in charge of bombarding the enemy’s clerics and ranged classes was now lying dead on the ground, so didn’t this put Tang Dynasty in an extremely precarious position?”

“It’s not like I wanted to die, I was insta-killed.” Muqing was extremely depressed.

“Quit trying to make up excuses, who is capable of insta-killing you?”

“Gongzi You.”

Wandering Clouds paused before making a weird cry: “Gongzi You, is Gongzi You here? How did she instakill you?” Whether it was about her player skill or his secret, Wandering Clouds was extremely cautious of this woman. As long as he was able to avoid butting heads with this person, he swore to never face her again.

Presently, Tang Dynasty was currently in a turf war with Wolf Pack, so why did this woman show up? This question only caused his head to ache.

“She passed by just now, Snow attacked her and I accidentally locked on to her...”

MuQing wasn’t done speaking when Glistening Snow butted in: ”What do you mean ‘I attacked her?’ She was riding a damned T-Rex and ran past me, it was just legitimate self-defence! She must have been the reinforcements that our opponent called to ambush us from the back! Even if I did attack first, so what!? She even took the initiative to kill me the previous time!”

Their conversation was made over the guild channel so all guild members could see what has happened. NightAndDay suddenly asked: “What ‘previous time?’ Was there any conflict between you guys and Gongzi You?”

Wandering Clouds hastily covered it up: ”It’s nothing, just a small misunderstanding.” Saying that, he hurriedly switched to the region channel and declared: ”Gongzi You, this is a fight between Tang Dynasty and Wolf Pack, it has nothing to do with you, do not interfere.”

As she had killed who she needed to kill, Ye Ci was already riding Ol’ Four’s back with the intention of leaving when she heard Wandering Clouds’s declaration. She let out an angry snort, wasn’t this the pot calling the kettle black?

She wasn’t going to let this go either and replied with a single line: “Continue with the self-deception, I see you’ve mastered the phrase ‘The pot calling the kettle black’ well.”

She had just finished speaking when she heard a system message: ”Sir Ditty has invited you to join his party.”

Even the guild leader of Wolf Pack was taking part in this fight. The corners of Ye Ci’s mouth twitched, wondering if NightAndDay, that poor cuckold, would make an appearance as well.